Confocal fluorescence microscopy for detection of cervical preneoplastic lesions

We examined and established the potential of ex-vivo confocal fluorescence microscopy for differentiating between normal cervical tissue, low grade Cervical Intraepithelial Neoplasia (CIN1), and high grade CIN (CIN2 and CIN3). Our objectives were to i) use Quantitative Tissue Phenotype (QTP) analysis to quantify nuclear and cellular morphology and tissue architecture in confocal microscopic images of fresh cervical biopsies and ii) determine the accuracy of high grade CIN detection via confocal microscopy. Cervical biopsy specimens of colposcopically normal and abnormal tissues obtained from 15 patients were evaluated by confocal fluorescence microscopy. Confocal images were analyzed and about 200 morphological and architectural features were calculated at the nuclear, cellular, and tissue level. For the purpose of this study, we used four features to delineate disease grade including nuclear size, cell density, estimated nuclear-cytoplasmic (ENC) ratio, and the average of three nearest Delaunay neighbors distance (3NDND). Our preliminary results showed ENC ratio and 3NDND correlated well with histopathological diagnosis. The Spearman correlation coefficient between each of these two features and the histopathological diagnosis was higher than the correlation coefficient between colposcopic appearance and histopathological diagnosis. Sensitivity and specificity of ENC ratio for detecting high grade CIN were both equal to 100%. QTP analysis of fluorescence confocal images shows the potential to discriminate high grade CIN from low grade CIN and normal tissues. This approach could be used to help clinicians identify HGSILs in clinical settings.